Papaoutai
by ms bricolage
Summary: two-part crack fic revolving around marinette and adrien's life post-reveal. current chapter: She's just spent nearly a half an hour sitting in a bathroom stall thinking up various rebuttals to the fictional argument her boss is going to have with her. In rhyme. Marinette's ridiculous. Everyone else is so, so much worse. (t rating for inevitable use of the f-word)
1. Chapter 1

**AN:** i know i'm supposed to be working on other things, which is exactly what spawned this. also a post which i can't post the link of on this silly site, but which you can go read if you go through my ao3 account of my tumblr (all at msbricolage).

* * *

"We need to go about this differently."

"Mhmm," he agrees, "definitely."

Her nose scrunches. "Currently it's a little…ineffective?"

"Rather than ineffective I'd say…"

"What?" She prods.

"Completely wrong." He leans over the bed to tap a finger against her sheet. "You're not even using the right equation Marinette."

"Noooo, not that—wait, what do you mean I've got the wrong equation?" She interrupts herself with a huff, moving to shoot him an incredulous look even though it means craning her head over the top of the bed.

"Well, why are you using Hooke's Law for a question about power?"

"What—no, look, there's the…that F, it's there, and it's in the question."

He flops onto his stomach, head knocking next to hers. Marinette's got sheets of paper spread across the floor in an attempt at mastering…something. Adrien's pretty sure it isn't physics.

"See, you want to put the force constant into this equation," he says, pointing, "so that you can get an answer to put into the one for potential energy."

"But that's deceptive."

"It's a test?" He tries, but when she continues to burn holes into the page with her stare, he settles with, "It's worth half your grade?"

She sighs, leaning back into his shoulder—he'd claimed the bed, throwing himself across it haphazardly after a long evening of patrolling, while Marinette had pulled several binders of notes out of her bag and settled onto the floor, back against her bed frame. Adrien was pretty comfortable just relaxing…Marinette's house is always so much cozier than his own, and it wasn't as if he was about to fail a final in physics. It was like, the one subject he was actual confident in.

"It's stupid is what it is." He makes a small noise of agreement. "Also true, I guess," she continues, looking up at him. It's when she bats her eyes at him that he thinks he's a lost cause. "So. Potential energy?"

He curls his lips. "Potential something." He mutters, turning into her neck and kissing her lightly.

"Adrien…" she starts warningly.

"It's uh, power multiplied by—" he nips at a particularly sensitive spot under her jaw, taking careful note of the way her fingers tighten, crinkling the formula sheet—patrolling always makes him a little…frisky, "—energy, equals mass multiplied by..."

He twists so that he's stretched over her face, which is tipped up to meet his. It's a perfect rom-com moment…which Marinette ruins by giggling. It's for the best, since Adrien finds he's gone completely blank on the rest of his sentence.

She's just so cute.

"No way kitty cat," she teases, cheeks flushed, "I've got—" he drops a small kiss on her nose, which predictably scrunches up again, "—things to master."

"No fair, you're setting me up!" He leans back though, grinning.

"You're rubbing off on me," she shrugs, "and you missed my point, getting all caught up in your ridiculous love of physics."

His grin widens, though he holds his tongue. Well, for a moment at least.

"Caught up in my ridiculous love of you—"

"Not the homework," she counters, putting the piece of paper down and turning to face him. She's still blushing though, so he counts it as a win. "I think we're going about the akumas the wrong way."

"What do you mean?"

She brings up her arms and crosses them on the bed, settling her chin on top of them. Adrien dies a little inside. So. Cute.

"Well like…we keep fighting the akumas. But we never go looking for the source of them. Plagg told me he could probably track down another miraculous stone user."

Adrien blinks. "Wait, Plagg told you?"

She grins. "What, is it weird that your akuma likes to hang out with me? Maybe you're setting a bad example."

"Maybe you're bribing him with cheese."

She shrugs, nonplussed. "It's not my fault you fall asleep here after a battle, leaving poor little Plagg—"

"Poor Plagg my ass—"

"—all hungry and sad."

"…You know you're being taken advantage of, right?"

"I am?"

"Mhmm."

There's that look in her eyes, then she's straightened up and is kissing him before he has a chance to think—there's a hand on his knee, hers, he realizes absently, opening himself to the kiss, and another one buried in his hair, and she's going to kill him. She cranes up until she's bent over him, and damn it, he likes being taken advantage of.

"So," she says, drawing back just so that he can lose himself in her eyes, "what do you think?"

"Excellent." he replies breathlessly, "You should do that again."

She smirks. "About the plan handsome boy. C'mon, keep up."

"Bringing the fight to the big bad?" She nods, her fingers carding an absolutely maddening rhythm through the hair at the nape of his neck. Just like this, she holds all of his weaknesses in the palm of her hand—he's settled himself there rather willing.

Just like this; he's being led by her, and he's following all too eagerly.

"Sounds paws-itively purrfect m'lady," he says, and cranes up to kiss the smile right off her lips.

* * *

There are a lot of stones.

"Why can't we just contact Master Fu?" Adrien groans, smashing his forehead into his keyboard. It's been four hours of googling news articles around the world, trying to differentiate between vigilantes and actual powered superheroes, and it's just—honestly, he deserves the pleasure of taking the frustration of attempting to translate Arabic out on his keyboards.

True to fashion, the computer makes a beeping noise and starts whirring rather rapidly. Adrien's too annoyed to lift his head up and see what exactly he's screwed up this time—with three computer monitors, there are a lot of options.

"Master Fu is all…unreachable for the good of mankind. Us-kind. Whatever, you know how he is." Marinette replies.

"Unreachable for the good of his tan you mean. Wasn't he in Nice last week?"

Marinette shrugs. "Possibly? Or Lisbon. It's only a five hour plane ride to Lisbon."

Adrien makes a noncommittal hum. "We could ditch the current plan, spend the weekend on the beach instead. Pretend to track down Master Fu."

"In Portugal?"

"Well there aren't really beaches in Paris." He teases.

There's the sound of laughter, and Adrien is weak—he can't help but flop his head over, turning his face to the side despite still resting it on top of the keyboards. Marinette is laying on her stomach on top of his bed, her laptop flipped open in front of her. Soft music filters from her speakers, something with a steady beat, slow and soothing.

It's moments like these that he needs to remember; imprint them onto the back of his eyelids so that he always knows what he's fighting for. Whohe's fighting for. It's sappy to think. He's sappy. Adrien finds that he doesn't really care, after all—Marinette likes that he's sappy. Marinette likeshim. Her existence in his life is enough to prompt any—

"How about this kitty," Marinette says, her voice filtering through Adrien's daydream, "If we can get rid of the source of all these akumas, I'll promise you a whole week in whatever sunny spot you want."

He bolts straight up in his seat. Blinks a few times. "Deal. Yeah, totally—deal."

She laughs again. "Fair warning, I tend to uh, freckle when I have too much sun."

Adrien feels dangerously reckless. "Wow," he says, strangled, "why haven't we been studying outside?"

Marinette's ears turn red as she smiles, not taking her eyes off her screen, "Because it's nearly winter, silly."

Adrien makes a sudden promise to himself that the moment it even threatens to turn balmy, he'll drag Marinette outside. He'll even get Tom and Sabine in on the plan—sunshine is healthy, okay, they'll appreciate his vested interest in their daughter's wellbeing…also, this way he'll get loads of bakery goods to go with them. Tom's macaroons are to die for, literally, he would take up arms if it meant a steady supply of his sweets.

Of course, he could just marry into Marinette's family, finally learn some of those secret recipes for himself…it's hardly an idle fantasy of his, nor is it the first time he's had it. Baked goods aside, it would formalize everything Adrien's been feeling for the past few years, add another ring to his finger to reinforce what the first one always meant…that he'd be at her side for as long as she'd have him, as a partner and a supporter. It's a ridiculous fantasy, one he always shies from telling Marinette—they're barely adults, according to the world, and they have so much more of themselves to discover…

But then he thinks of what Marinette might look like a few years from now and he wants it.

"Adrien," Marinette says, "you're purring."

He leans back in his chair. "Mhmm," he agrees, not taking his eyes off her. "Just thinking about beaches."

She turns to him. She's flustered—he can tell, even when she doesn't blush or stammer, he can just tell. Which is sort of ridiculous, since formonths pre-reveal, Adrien had no idea Marinette was nervous around him.

He watches her now—eyes wide, her mouth parted just a bit. Adrien in the past was an idiot.

"Beaches?" She repeats.

"Yeah," he says softly.

There's a loaded moment of silence before she collects herself, which she does in the way of hooking a pillow with her feet and launching it in Adrien's general direction. He only avoids it because he sees the expression on her face a split second before she moves—a mixture of nerves and delight—and can't stop himself from doubling over in laughter.

And they say he's the unlucky one.

"What—"

"Adrien Agreste," she says in a commanding tone, nearly masking her own laughter, "you stop imaging me in a bikini right now and—just, focus on the plan," he sits up, holding his hands out in the universal gesture of peace—Marinette keeps going, "and…and…"

"And what?" he purrs.

"And—Plagg," Adrien stares at her in confusion, at least until the kwami himself shoots up, startled out of his spot curled under the covers of Adrien's bed, "Plagg, please help knock some sense into your friend."

Plagg yawns widely in response. "Yeah," he mutters, "because I'm the sensible one."

Adrien just keeps his hands up, smiling. "No, I got it—akumas before beaches."

She nods. Adrien continues blithely, "At least until summertime."

It's a sign of how long they've been working together that Marinette just shakes her head a little and flops back down onto the bed without any further protest. Adrien takes his cues where they're given, and spins around in his chair to see what sort of damage he's done to the computer screens.

It's…they're blue. Death blue. The blue of a thousand dying electronics.

"Plagg," he groans into his hands, "remind me again why we can't just go with your gut instinct?"

The kwami floats a slow barrel roll, his version of a shrug. "We could," he says, "but I'll just as soon point you in the direction of the stone that's in Pakistan as I will the one that's in Paris. I don't do distance, just…direction."

Marinette perks up. "There's a miraculous stone in Pakistan?"

"I dunno. Could be. There's one east of us," Plagg heads over to her, flopping between the spot where her elbows rest on Adrien's duvet. "The stone's go where they're needed."

Adrien's phone buzzes. He reads the text quick and stands up, stretching until he thinks he can actually feel his toes again.

"Well this stone is going where it's needed…which is with Nino and Alya. They invited us to hang out. Ten minute break?"

Marinette scoffs at the ten minute part, but she also immediately closes her laptop. "Oh kitty," she says, "you read my mind."

"Good." Adrien shoots a desperate look at his computer monitors. "Because I think I might have broken my internet."

* * *

It is pure luck that as the four of them stroll through Paris' streets—attempting to decide between one bowling alley and the next—something sets Plagg off. He perks up out of Marinette's bag, Tikki close behind him.

Adrien, who will shamelessly use any excuse in these situations, sidles next to her and leans into her personal space. "What is it?" he whispers.

Marinette turns wide eyes to him. At her side, Plagg says, "I felt the stone. It's uh…just around the block."

"Around this block?"

Tikki nods. It's all the confirmation they need. Adrien covers as Marinette sneaks away, just to confirm it's a house and not a shop of some kind, and to jot down the address so that they have a place to come back to.

They'd go tonight only…well Alya is under the absolutely incorrect notion that she's better than him at bowling, and someone's got to set the record straight.

Or just plain set the record as it were.

"I can't believe Marinette left before we'd decided which alley to go to." Alya complains, boring holes into Adrien's skull—Alya is a bit of a reporter type, and Adrien is…well, really bad at lying.

"She's just—had to make a call!"

"And she couldn't make it here?"

Adrien shuffles forward nervously. "You know Marinette, never wants to hamper others. She'll just meet us at the bowling alley—"

Alya huffs. "We never decided on a bowling alley."

"Uhm…I'll text her?" He holds up his phone hopefully.

There's always this faint whisper in the back of his mind when he talks to Alya. Mostly it just goes Alya knows, Alya knows, Alya knows. Usually Adrien keeps this to himself—less pressure for Marinette, firstly, and if he's wrong, well…Marinette isn't always the most subtle about secrets.

It's absolutely adorable. Just, bad for the heart, probably.

Only now, as he inadvertently enters a staring contest with Alya, over Marinette or the bowling alley or just secrets, Adrien thinks it'll be all too soon before he can accost Marinette and beg her to just let Alya know.

It's a little hypocritical, since he hasn't told Nino yet either—only, Alya is great at secrets, keeps confidential sources completely air locked, which is impressive since they're eighteen and Adrien isn't sure how many confidential sources most eighteen year olds even have. Nino is…just as bad as Adrien is. But louder.

They successfully make it to the bowling alley at the same time Marinette does, which doesn't really help the whole you stopped to make a phone call but somehow also beat us here line of questioning that starts up. Luckily Nino is there, and Nino is competitive and cheery and easily waylays the conversation into do or die.

Adrien does. Marinette sort of…dies.

"What," she says defensively, "I'm athletic. This isn't a sport."

Alya hollers, "We've had this argument before—it's a sport."

"There's no physical benefit—"

"If there are nationals," Alya says, "it's a sport."

Marinette sulks at Adrien's laughing face. "Yeah, that's how she got me to agree the first time."

Alya saunters back from her spot at the lane, radiating confidence—which makes sense, since she's just gotten her third strike in a row. She high fives Nino as she passes, collapsing into the seat next to Adrien.

"You're laughing now lover boy," she says, "but I don't think you understand how bad Marinette is at this. Your team is going down."

"Hey!" Marinette cries.

Alya shrugs, smiling. "Girl, I am your number one fan," Adrien glances at her nervously, "but you are terrible at any game that isn't on a video screen."

Marinette laughs. "It's true."

Adrien wraps his arm around Marinette as the three of them turn to watch Nino's ball bank slowly to the left, dropping into the gutter well before it can reach the pins. "You know," he says, "I wouldn't worry about my team."

Alya smirks. "Oh no. I taught Nino well. Marinette is unteachable. You can't even try."

Adrien glances from one girl to the next, only minutely distracted by the way the fluorescent lights bring out the already small spattering of spots on Marinette's nose, something he can't stop noticing now that she's mentioned it to him.

"You won't let me try?" He asks.

Marinette leans into Adrien's side and smiles peacefully. "Adrien?"

He grins. "Yeah?"

"If you ever make me spend my summer at a bowling alley and call it for the greater good I will hurt you. As in 'make sure you never get another baked good in your life' hurt you."

Adrien shoots Alya a look. She just widens her eyes, innocent if not for the smirk that touches her lips. "It was one summer."

"A summer from hell." Marinette frowns. "I smelled like feet. Just, all the time, me and the feet smell. For no reason."

"For science. For integrity! For—"

They're distracted by a loud cheer. Adrien watches as Nino does a small circle around the front of the lane, humming a tune that sounds like it might come from Rocky.

"I got it on the second go!"

Alya blows him a kiss. "Awesome babe!" She turns back to laugh at Adrien's dumbstruck expression. "I told you. Practicing with Nino was easy."

Marinette blows at a stray strand of hair that's fallen on her nose. "Just because you get all hot and bothered by competition and use making out as a reward system—"

Nino, almost on cue, plops into the seat next to Aly and drops a quick kiss on her lips. Nothing risqué, but enough that Marinette leans over Adrien to point a finger in Alya's face, and cry, "See?" as Alya smiles widely.

Adrien uses the position to his advantage and noses at Marinette's ear. "Making out as a rewards system?" He whispers.

Marinette startles back into her seat, her hand on her ear. Her eyes narrow. "No."

"I didn't say anything—"

"You didn't have to," she says.

He protests, "But—"

"No."

"It could be—"

"Bad kitty."

Alya makes a punched out noise that makes Adrien heavily tempted to just lay his head in his hands for a long while. Nino stares at them all and slowly says, "I think I missed something."

"Nope," Marinette says, "Just me about to go up there and kick ass."

They go on to bowl three games, all of which Adrien and Marinette lose.

It's an amazing night.

* * *

"Okay, so…whoever it is, they live in...an abandoned house."

She nods, biting her lip—one of Ladybug's rather charming tells, which simultaneously gives away her plans and drives Chat insane.

"Actually," she counters, "they live in an abandoned mansion."

"Does that make it better?"

"Uhm…probably not."

He rolls back on his heels. "Sooooo…we're going in?"

"Yup," she frowns suddenly, "It's not weird right?"

There's a man on the street corner who's been stopped long enough that Chat isn't surprised when he pulls out his phone and raises it up in the obvious glee of someone who's just spotted a celebrity and can't wait to prove it to ten of their closest friends. Usually it's just some well-intended citizen, eager to add to their snapchat story, but the media can get a little crazy.

"What's not weird?" He asks absently, stepping up to Ladybug's side and putting himself solidly between her and the man's camera phone.

A click goes off, the silicone material of his ears twitching as they catch the far-off sound waves. Beside him Ladybug huffs.

"That it was so easy." she says, nudging her hip into his.

"Easy? Did you see how much cambert I had to give Plagg this morning? We might have shorted Paris' supplies."

"You're too hard on him."

"You're too nice." He teases, lips already quirked up in an easy grin. "And," he adds, "the only thing really weird about this is that he's here still and there's no akuma terrorizing the city."

"What, do you think he lives here full time? Maybe he's just lonely."

Chat snorts. "Well then, that'll be an easy fix—we can just take the big bad guy out for some coffee and pain du chocolate."

"Right, that's a good plan. Nothing with cheese in it though." Ladybug laughs.

He feels his face drop. "Agreed."

The inside of the mansion is creepy enough—first off, who has an abandoned mansion in Paris, like, who can even afford to not live in it? The sheer wastefulness is scary in its own right. And secondly, it's just, it's super dusty, on account of being abandoned and all, and Chat can't stop sneezing every time there's a dramatic lengthy pause.

They clear the first two levels of the house, which leaves them faced with the rickety spiral staircase that leads up into the attic. Chat makes a face at this, quickly covered by Ladybug's hand as she tries to stifle his sneeze.

"We'll never have the element of surprise at this rate." She hisses. Marinette's a little snappy when she's nervous, which shows even as her superhero self.

Chat puts his hands over hers and pulls them away, bending his head closer to hers so that he can whisper. "If they're in the attic, with the giant window, I think we've already lost that." He points out.

Her eyes narrow. "So our sneak attack is, ah—"

"Oh, you wouldn't—"

"—out the window?"

Chat's cheeks stretch with the force of his grin. Also with the force of keeping his sneezing down.

"Spot on." He agrees. Ladybug scrunches her nose and Chat has to give himself a moment's pause to clear the I love you I love you I love you that circles in his head.

Of course, when they open the door to the attic, he gets the pleasure of his mind going completely blank of everything except the thought that—wow, that's a lot of fucking butterflies.

"That's a lot of butterflies," Ladybug says next to him.

There's a man in the middle of the chaos—of course there would be, otherwise what is the point of this whole adventure. He's dressed in greys and purples and a ridiculous mask. Only his lips show, two thin lines stretch towards his chin in stark disapproval…it might look intimidating, if they could see the rest of his face, but with the mask the way it is, the Big Bad of their lives just seems…weird.

I shouldn't throw stones in glass houses, he thinks. After all, he wears silicone cat ears on top of his head. Mind you, he looks really fucking adorable doing so, but—

Right. Evil man, creepy attic.

Adrien sneezes again. Even up here there is so much dust. It's not his fault then, that the first thing he says to the big bad guy who's been terrorizing them for the last few years—on and off again, depending on the season—is,

"Dude. I think you need to clean up your act-ic."

The man blinks. Ladybug pointedly refuses to look his way. Chat resists high fiving himself and only manages by sneaking his hands behind his back and doing it where Ladybug can't have any evidence.

"Ladybug! And Chat Noir," the man says after a beat, deciding to ignore him, "Just the two people I want to see! You have made a grave mistake coming upon my lair this evening—"

"You know," Ladybug cuts in, hands on her hips—and her weapon, "you didn't even know we were coming."

He scoffs, "Preposterous-"

"And," she presses, "from what I can tell, you never want to actually see us in person…you just send your little minions here to infect people and come after us by proxy."

"Unsuccessfully," Chat adds.

"Unsuccessfully send your little minions to come after us." She repeats.

The man—Butterfly Bandit? Papillon de jour? Had he nicknamed himself or were there possibilities?—stares at Ladybug for a second, lips pursed. They're so thin they practically disappear when pressed together. His stare continues long enough that it's awkward, the dramatic pause building and building until it just...flops; maybe he constantly sent out proxies to interact with them because he was actually really bad at snarky comebacks.

"Just leave then, if you're going to judge." He says at last.

"No judging—"

Chat interrupts, "A little bit of judging."

"Not much judging then," Ladybug amends, shooting him an exasperated look, "but more uhm—are you not going to try and attack us?"

The man straightens. "Is that what you want me to do?"

Ladybug stares. Stares some more. "Nooo?" Chat interjects, even though it comes out more like a question than a statement.

"Then I shall—"

"Wait!" Ladybug holds up her hands. "What if I said it was what I wanted?"

The man's eyes narrow. He taps his cane against the floor a few times but makes to move to use it. Chat's beginning to believe that it's no more of a weapon than the butterflies are; a prop rather than an instrument to fight with. Though there's no doubt about it—between the utter lack of denial and the extraordinary number of butterflies, this has to be the guy they want.

But...it really is a ridiculous number of butterflies. Do they stay here all the time? What do they eat? Does the man raise them, and does that mean there are some caterpillars lazying about in a yet to be discovered wing of this place, just waiting to turn into butterflies for this dude to fuck around with? And also, what is up with this attic, it is super fucking nice. Chat wouldn't even mind living in an attic this nice, provided there was a bed and a usable internet connection.

His thoughts tumble from him rather helplessly, particularly given that the man is silent yet again, as if he needs the time to consider Ladybug's question. "This is really weird," he hisses.

Ladybug whispers back without taking her eyes from the man. "I know that."

"Yes but does he know that?"

"He's going to if you keep talking."

"I will not fight you," the man declares abruptly, with a hint of triumph in his tone. "I won't give you what you want."

Chat's beginning to have a bad feeling about all of this.

The sun only barely filters through the window, creating a spotlight of sorts on their villain. He's still just...standing there, looking for all intents and purposes as if he's just thwarted their plans. Chat has to resist the urge to start swatting at the butterflies, if only for something to do.

"Okay well," Ladybug looks at him uncertainly, "Sir, you are under arrest for uh..."

"Nefariousness?" Chat suggests. He doesn't mention that they're probably not really allowed to make arrests. The rules are a little...smudged when it comes to them.

"Intent to commit a crime?"

"Illegal possession of a fuck ton of butterflies?"

The man scowls. "I have done nothing wrong."

Chat leans over. "He's getting mad at us." He says under his breath.

Ladybug nods. "Yup."

"For criticizing him."

"Looks that way."

Chat clears his throat. "Sir? You know you're—trespassing!" He steps forward excitedly. "Yeah, you're trespassing, that's illegal."

"That's a crime." Ladybug agrees. "And the police here happen to like us a lot."

"Even if we were judging you for...well, you know. Being a villain."

"Releasing evil butterflies?"

"Right, even if we were judging you for that, it doesn't really matter, since we're here because you're uhm...trespassing."

Ladybug side eyes him. Chat realizes there's a bit of a conundrum in terms of actually charging a man for using people's inner weaknesses against them. He doesn't voice this out loud.

The man's shoulders go stiff. He suspiciously stops moving and Chat has to start worrying if maybe he's forgotten to breathe altogether.

"Sir...?"

"You just don't understand." The man mutters under his breath.

"Sir—" Chat repeats.

"It's Hawkmoth," the guy hisses, finally turning around again. "Sir Hawkmoth, I suppose, if you must—"

"No, just Hawkmoth is fine." Ladybug interrupts. She's sending Chat these looks, which he's getting a little fearful over. Ladybug's looks tend to mean the start of some plan or another that Chat probably isn't going to approve of. Not that it matters, since Marinette leads this little sideshow, and Chat's probably going to listen anyway.

"If we don't understand why you're...turning Paris into bad guys, maybe you could help us to."

Oh no.

Ladybug glances over at him, eyes wide and pointed. Eyes that say oh yes.

So Chat takes note of the room that their arch nemesis is calling home, a room that contains neither hawks nor moths. And he nods.

Ladybug smiles, even if it's a little wobbly, like even she thinks this is a bad idea. She takes a step closer to Hawkmoth. "So uhm...how does coffee sound?"

* * *

There are at least five different people surreptitiously taking videos of their group. It's not exactly worse than the time Vulpina came into town and everyone had taken to stalking the three of them, assuming some sort of superhero love triangle, though it's absolutely weirder. Chat supposes that Hawkmoth looks a bit too...off, for that to happen.

Well—old. Chat never knew how old to peg Ladybug prior to their reveal, but it's definitely nowhere near the age of Hawkmoth. Hawkmoth, with the full grey, silicone mask that's frankly a little too reminiscent of some sort of S&M play, and who's weeping into a cup of earl grey.

He watches idly as a sixth phone creeps up over someone's shoulder. Even if they were out of costume, the crying sort of draws attention.

"I just don't understand them!"

"Mmm," Ladybug soothes, laying her hand over one of Hawkmoth's. She'd stopped sending those helpless looks of confusion to Chat after he'd made his third bird-related pun of the evening. It wasn't his fault—his bird humour was just so much better than his bug stuff.

Chat leans over the table. "Teenagers?"

Hawkmoth nods.

"You don't…understand teenagers?"

Hawkmoth nods again, this time accompanied by a hiccuping sob. It's…really weird.

"Uhm," Ladybug starts off uncertainly, despite rarely being uncertain while wearing the costume, "and this relates to your uh, your son?"

"And…" he sniffs, "my—my missing wife—"

Hawkmoth, as it turns out, needs more friends. Possibly also less subordinates.

Chat wants someone to pinch him. He wants to go to bed and wake up to do this day over again, this time with a larger dash of reality. Because seriously? This is the evil mastermind they've been fighting all this time? Hawkmoth has spent at least half of their transformation time whining about how hard it is to raise a son who refuses to keep good company. He'd even mentioned—by name—the mayor's daughter. If Hawkmoth's biggest motivator was that his son wouldn't hang out with Chloe, well…Chat didn't really see anything they could do.

Hey, he liked Chloe just fine, when she's wasn't being…so, Chloe, about things. But she was definitely an acquired taste.

Everyone has family problems I guess.

The sobbing goes on for another few minutes as Ladybug tries to convince Hawkmoth that maybe, just maybe, the police might be a better option for finding a missing person. Compared to say, stealing all the miraculous stones and using their theoretical combined power to track her down, mysterious past or not. She even offers to put in a good word for him.

"After all," she says, quite reasonably, "some of the stones might be in America. You would have to go find an abandoned attic in Vegas, and no one wants to do that."

"You'd be sharing it with a bunch of drunk Americans." Chat adds.

This, of all things, makes Hawkmoth gasp in horror. "You might have a point."

"Anyway, you're skating over the most important question," Chat interrupts, because at this rate they'll spend yet another hour talking about the difference between being open with your feelings and having absolutely no verbal filter, and seriously Hawkmoth if you tell your son he's the bane of your existence just because he broke a piece of furniture of course he's going to have issues with you. Hawkmoth and Ladybug both shift their gazes to him, which is a little bit intimidating, sure, but he's Chat Noir, master of the awkward one liners, and so he presses on.

"It's just—Hawkmoth? I mean—really? Your big finish is butterflies, you know, little, fragile, fluttering—they have nothing to do with hawks! I get the moth thing, kind of, if you want to go there…"

Ladybug drops her head into her hands with a protracted groan. Hawkmoth leans back in his chair, tapping his finger to his chin.

"Hmm," he says, consideringly, "you might have a point."

Chat nods vigorously. "Right? I know technically we don't get to pick our names, but the press doesn't need to know that. It's not like you've ever given it to them."

"And you're assuming I will be?"

Chat shoots a look at the iPhone being held up at the booth across from them, likely recording this scene and any scene which might come after. Hawkmoth and Ladybug both follow his gaze, which must make an interesting snippet for the person filming.

"I'm assuming someone's going to give you one if you don't." he says unnecessarily. Adds, "And then you might be stuck with something awful."

"Awful?" Hawkmoth repeats.

Chat takes a moment to stare pointedly at the cane. The flourished and exaggerated lapels. The freaky mask. "Awful." He confirms.

"Moustache Mobster," Ladybug offers.

"What—"

"Well it's not like people know you've got…butterflies," Marinette waves exasperatedly, "And your suit looks like it's got an inverted moustache on it. And even if they do…"

"Mister Butterfly," Chat presses, "Your theme song will be that Butterfly song by ." He hums a little bit of the tune—even at this point Chat knows that Hawkmoth has likely never heard the song, let alone the terrible memes that might follow. Hawkmoth's face—the part that's visible—pales. Chat can't help himself from adding, "And that mask…"

Hawkmoth takes a long sip from his cup, likely to hide his discomfort—he does so rather elegantly, despite the fact that it's in a paper cup and costs only a few euros.

"…I will consider it." He says magnanimously. "Though I shall stick to my name."

Chat doesn't even argue. Well, not yet at least. Even though Papillon de Jour would be funny and a pun.

"So," Ladybug says, and Chat tunes back into the conversation, "next week, same time, same place?"

Hawkmoth sighs. Sniffles. Gives in.

"Sounds good."

* * *

Headlines read: Crime-fighting duo defeats evil with caffeine and carbohydrates. There's a picture below of the three of them, centred around Hawkmoth snickering into a cup of what Adrien knows is chamomile tea, drunk at Ladybug's suggestion.

It's ridiculous. It's insane. It's...working.

"If I knew crime fighting would involve this much butter..." Marinette mutters to herself. Adrien snorts, leaning over and ruffling her hair.

"You look perfect," he says, rolling his r's as is custom, inside or outside the mask, "the polka dot leg warmers are a nice touch."

"It's supposed to be freezing today." she defends.

"I was being honest! You always look beautiful."

Marinette's cheeks flush. It's Adrien's sole delight to see her like this, half in costume, blushing and pleased and lovely.

The latest message on Adrien's group chat reads **HM** : I will meet you two there. Bring gloves. Children should know to bundle up. At this point Adrien knows better than to argue, which is why Marinette has gone ahead and knit him a little toque with matching cat ears on the crest.

"It's not so bad," Marinette says, "Hawkmoth even pays every time we go out."

"Hawkmoth is my dad's age and probably has a full time job. And since he's not trying to steal our stones anymore—"

"Well Tikki told me that they can't do anything about his missing wife."

"—yeah, so he basically just has a lot of time on his hands," Adrien finishes, sneaking over to where Marinette is fussing with her hair, stealing a quick kiss. It's a bit of a pastime pleasure of his to see how long he can keep her cheeks the same shade as her costume.

"What you're saying is…we have a new best friend." she says after a moment.

"…Well, more like a high handed sponsor. But sure."

Marinette laughs. "We're facebook friends."

"On the PR page maybe." He picks up his phone—a different one from his main cell, bought for the sole purpose of communicate as a superhero—and sends a quick meet you on the north side of the rink to Hawkmoth. "I think it's more like we're his peek into the inner workings of a teenager's mind."

"You give good advice." she says.

Adrien snorts. "Maybe I should give some of it to my dad."

"Hey now," Marinette starts, "he's been better recently."

"He tried to buy me a planetarium the other day." He deadpans at her. "A whole planetarium."

Marinette giggles. "Well you did say you liked space."

"Once! Off-hand! If he was going to buy me a telescope, a personal size one would've probably been better to start with."

"Probably."

Three buzzes go off in quick succession in Adrien's pocket. He doesn't need to look at it to know that Hawkmoth's likely sent all three separate messages with different nitpickings over their outfit choices, despite neither knowing what the two of them decided to wear nor if they've even left the house yet. Hawkmoth, it turns out, has a lot of money, and a lot of the high handedness that goes a long with that—even when he means well.

Even if he bought the two of them custom made winter jackets last week, to go with their superhero outfits, simply because they'd gone out in the early winter weather wearing sweaters. Even if Marinette's collection of Chat and Ladybug themed clothing was getting a bit too big to be easily explained away as a bit of a fan obsession.

"We should probably get going," he says slowly, as another rapid fire succession of buzzes come from his phone. He refuses to look at them right away—it'd be enabling the poor man, and from the sounds of things there are far too many enablers in Hawkmoth's life.

"Crime fighting time," Marinette says jokingly as Tikki pops out of her akuma sized puddle of blankets. Winter really isn't their favourite season, and the transformation times seem to be shorter purely out of spite for the cold. Not that it really matters—these days they tend to use the transformations for increasingly infrequent patrols and meeting up with the newest member of the miraculous stone squad.

By far the neediest member.

Marinette hollers out her goodbye to her parents, even though she's halfway out the window, in full costume—winter jacket and leg warmers included—and has no way of explaining to Sabine and Tom how they've left the apartment without being seen. Adrien's convinced that Marinette's parents know about their second lives and are just keeping it to themselves until Marinette decides to tell them. It's the Dupain-Cheng thing to do, complete trust and understanding despite suspecting the dangerous half of her lifestyle. Adrien is even more convinced that this is the family he needs to marry into.

Now, if only he could get his father to understand...

* * *

 **More A/N:** there are so many things i would explain here, except i clearly warned you this was dumb, look, it's right there in the tags.

this is entirely spawned because i have writer's block and i happened to read that one comic. you should all read it too, it's a+.

( post/136991517289/my-thoughts-on-hawkmoth-man-just-needs-to-sit)

i realize that hawkmoth is actually a type of insect, as opposed to two separate things, one hawk, one moth, but for the sake sake of my humor you'll have to just bear with me there. also, for any of you wondering, papillon de nuit is the french word for moth. it literally translates into night butterfly, which is kinda ridiculous french people. since hawkmoth only seems to attack during the day, i though papillon de jours would be a funny name. look, you and i know he uses butterflies. so does chat noir. it just happens to be a pun both far-reaching and dumb enough that chat would probably like it, and no one can tell me otherwise.

(well, you could. but i'd probably cover my ears and loudly hum that butterfly song by )

as for the inevitable "why doesn't adrien figure out that hawkmoth is his dad," which as you may be able to tell is clearly the angle i was going for? tv magic, or w/e it is that keep ladybug from recognizing adrien outside the mask and vice versa. although you can assume that a few months/years down the line, when papa agreste has given adrien too many gifts that are SUSPICIOUSLY like what he recommends hawkmoth do, only ridiculously out of proportion, adrien figures it out. and cries. a lot. not because he's sad, but because his dad lived in an attic with butterflies for actual years and is the owner of a ridiculous mask that reminds him of s&m. poor adrien, he has it rough.

(yes the title is from that stromae song. don't judge. you're here with me.)


	2. Chapter 2

There's absolute _nothing_ glamorous about finding out you're pregnant. Nada. Not a thing. You skip a month and so the worry sets in—a lot of it, because you go on to let another month pass thinking that maybe it was just stress, or, or—hormones, those can be weird, and the body has really messed up ways of showing that something's fucked up, it doesn't _have_ to be a baby. Not that a baby is a bad thing, now, but like…it just feels like jumping to conclusions. It feels irresponsible. It feels like repeating the same god damn thought cycle for another thirty odd-what days, after which comes the squatting in the bathroom at work with an expensive piece of plastic and the knowledge that your friends are going to start to wonder why you've holed yourself up there for the last twenty minutes.

It's dumb. Those with the penises and the university classes don't have to go through this ridiculousness. Marinette feels a lot of resentment in those twenty minute to those with the penises and the university classes who aren't responding to her twenty-seven text messages. Mind you at least half of those are the upside down face emoji, but _it's the principal of the thing_ , okay, Marinette had to buy a very expensive piece of plastic during her lunch break and she's feeling needy.

Still, when the sign turns positive, she's…a little elated. Not because of the glamour—there is _no_ glamour, let her reiterate that absolutely nothing about this has been appealing, and she has another two minutes before her boss notices her missing and fires her—but because. Well.

 _Baby_.

She stares at the little plus sign and enjoys approximately 3.6 seconds of joy before reality hits, like a sledgehammer with the words _dread_ etched on the side _._ Because now she has to _tell_ everyone. _Everyone_. And Marinette really isn't exaggerating when she says she's the least dramatic in her circle of friends and family, and she's just spent nearly a half an hour sitting in a bathroom stall thinking up various rebuttals to the fictional argument her boss is going to have with her. _In rhyme_. You never know when your life is going to turn into a musical after all, and this _is_ Paris.

Marinette's bad. Everyone else is so, so much worse.

* * *

She tells Alya first, about five seconds later. Partially out of panic, partially as a cop-out—she'd misspoken…misthought…mis-something, anyway, earlier, because Alya is _not_ ridiculous, not in the way that Marinette is agonizing over. Alya might squeal in her ear and start planning the baby's theoretical third birthday party, but that's…relatively fine.

"You're _what_?"

"Pregnant," Marinette leans against the bathroom countertops—she'd come outside the stall as a sort of compromise with herself, because if someone walks in and has proof that she's been holed up in here for her entire lunch break, they at least don't have to overhear her freaking out. "Possibly fired." She tacks on as an afterthought.

Alya sighs, clear even over the phone. "You're not _fired_ , the Madam loves you. She just expresses that love…very intensely."

"You've only interviewed her once, okay, I don't understand how you can interview her _one time_ and know all of her life's secrets."

"Trick of the trade." Alya says smugly. "And off-topic. You're really pregnant?"

Marinette shrugs even though Alya can't see it. She's staring idly at herself in the bathroom mirror, _she_ can see. She looks a little patchy, actually, like she's pale and flushed at the same time. Which—accurate.

"Barring some sort of bizarre alternative medical condition—"

"Which is doubtful."

"Yeah, barring that," Marinette continues, "then yes, I'm pregnant."

"Wow." Alya whispers.

"Yeah."

" _Wow._ "

"Yeah."

"When did you find out?"

She glances down at her watch. "Two minutes and thirteen seconds ago."

"Were you guys trying?"

"Nope. It's just a fluke."

"Well…that's quite the fluke. Are you freaking out?" Marinette can hear the smile in Alya's voice, so obviously Alya knows that _yes, clearly I am freaking out_.

"Noooo," she says anyway, "but also, yes? I mean, it's a freak-out sort of situation."

"Yeah?" Alya's voice goes a little tinny over the line—she's always moving around places, scoping out interviews and whatnot and very rarely sitting at her desk typing away like a normal reporter, so Marinette's used to this. "Is it a bad freak-out or a good one? Like, are you exercising your right to choose or…?"

"No, no, it's good. I mean…" she stares at the little plastic stick in her hands, caught up in an intense feeling of _something_ and smiles kind of dumbly down at it—she knows, because she spots her reflection in the mirror a few seconds later and tries _really hard_ to stop. "I'm twenty-three. It's…young, but not crazy. I have a job, we have the money, the space…"

"The crazy adoring relatives who are going to go over the top when you tell them?"

 _This_ is why they've been best friends for forever. " _Yes_ ," Marinette says a little desperately, "there is literally nobody who is not going to be weird about this. My parents. Adrien. Adrien's _dad_ , oh god, he's going to buy us an entire _Tartine et Chocolat_ store, I can just see it now."

Alya laughs. "I've always been more of a _Finger in the Nose_ kind of gal myself, as far as baby clothing goes." Marinette does not stop to think why Alya even _has_ an opinion on this already, over a decade of friendship has taught Marinette not to be surprised by the things Alya has formed an opinion on. "But let's be real, if the last few years are anything to go by, when Gabriel Agreste finds out you're carrying the future Agreste fashionista he's going to open up his own brand of children's wear and get super offended if you put your child in literally anything else."

"You are _not_ helping."

"Oh?" Marinette can feel the grin coming through the phone line. "If you think that's bad, wait until you tell Hawkmoth."

Keeping their secret identities had only really worked until Alya had interviewed them once and noticed that Marinette-and-Adrien as a couple acted eerily similar to Ladybug-and-Chat as a couple…and also, Marinette was oddly terrible at keeping secrets when asked head-on. This was also something Alya knew. Alya as an investigative reporter kind of terrified Marinette to be honest.

Marinette groans, tipping her head forward to rest on the mirrored surface. Probably unsanitary, but whatever. She _deserves_ to rest her face on gross mirrors.

"What is my life even?" She mumbles to herself.

"Excellent, obviously, because I'm in it." Alya says, then swears under her breath. "Babe, I've got to run. I think the guy I'm tailing noticed me."

Marinette keeps her eyes closed. "What is _your_ life even?"

"Exciting," Alya says easily. "Look, call me later tonight, or after Adrien stops freaking out, whatever comes first. And I'll let Nino know after that, if you want, so they can freak out together."

"That…sounds very reasonable actually."

"And get back to work. The Madam loves you, but by my count you're ten minutes late."

 _Shit_. "Right. Okay. Uhm…Alya?"

"Yeah?" She sounds out of breath—if Marinette had to guess she's probably literally running now, though she's not sure if she's chasing after someone or trying to run away from them. Alya's life is quite honestly as crazy as Marinette's superhero one, only without the advantage of anonymity.

"You're going to be the godmother, right?"

"Duh." Alya says, laughing, and hangs up.

* * *

Adrien comes next, since he's half responsible for this whole thing, and because Marinette is going to need him as back-up when she tells…well, everyone else. Plus, it's _fun_. She knows he's going to be excited, probably flustered and all over the place, doing that squirmy blushing thing he does when he gets good news and doesn't know how to process it—she's not nervous about that, like, at all. _And_ she gets to text him weird puns all day long that are clearly going over his head and weirding him out.

They meet up on his campus, after Marinette stays an hour late at work to appease Madam, crazy designer junky that she is, and all of Adrien's labs have finished. She's always surprised by how much she enjoys the routines her and Adrien have—how he always kisses her when he spots her loitering on campus, a quick delighted press of his lips, almost as if he can't help himself. How they take their time meandering down the street towards their apartment, despite it being winter outside, despite Adrien needing a minimum of three layers to last the ten-minute jaunt.

She takes a _lot_ of pleasure in staring very placidly at him when he offers to indulge in yet another routine, heading across the street to nip into the store and pick them up some wine.

"It's Friday!" he says when he sees her face. "It's—we get to relax! Forget about the doctorate and your shitty boss—"

"She's not _that_ bad." Marinette defends.

"—and then we sleep in Saturday and ignore Nino texting us to hang out—"

" _He's_ not that bad."

"Marinette."

She caves and laughs. "Adrien, I _like_ our traditions. Even if getting tipsy on wine and avoiding our friends is uhm…maybe not a tradition we want to pass on?"

He eyes her strangely. "…Right."

"Let's go home." She says, tugging him forward. He looks at the store as the walk past it.

"So no wine. Again."

"Nope." She confirms—she'd been passing on it for the last four Fridays, just in case. "But there's a bun in the oven waiting for us at the apartment."

It's fairly obvious—honestly, she'd started with smaller, less noticeable ones, but thanks to a bad meeting with his overseeing professor they'd all gone over his head. His sad, wine-less head.

This one stops him in his tracks.

"Uhm," she glances back to catch his wide-eyed look. "I…what?"

"Hmm?" she asks innocently.

He licks his lips. "You said…and with the…"

"Yes?"

They're in the middle of the sidewalk. There's still five minutes of walking before they reach home. Still, she lets him tug her to a stop, smiling up at him when he winds his arms around her.

He glances from side to side, shifty, as if someone is going to overhear them. "Are you…it's—maybe I'm jumping to conclusions here, but uhm…"

There's clearly _some_ sort of gap he's having trouble crossing, between thinking the thing and saying the words out loud. Marinette takes pity on him and leans back into his arms—she loves him, after all, and he's already doing the blushy-squirmy thing that's so _charming_.

"Yup." She confirms. "I am."

"You are."

"Mhmm."

" _Really_?"

His eyes go wider. Adrien has amazing eyes. Marinette kind of hopes the kid gets his instead. "Barring some sort of weird medical mishap—"

Just like Alya, Adrien cuts her off. Unlike Alya, it's a lot more physical. Marinette giggles as Adrien picks her up and spins her around, dipping her face into the crook of his shoulder and getting a mouthful of scarf, delighted as the world spins.

He stops just as suddenly and puts her down. "Oh, god, you shouldn't be—that's…there's _ice_ , oh man, how are you _feeling_ , why did you let me bring us outside today it's so _cold_ , are you okay, is—"

Ah—the freaking out part. She's a little surprised that she's more amused than annoyed, although she probably shouldn't be. It's _Adrien_. Adrien is _awesome._

"I'm probably no more than a month or two along, calm down. You're the one who can't stand the cold."

"But—"

"Shh," she puts a finger over his lips—payback, since she's got gloves on, and now Adrien gets a mouthful of wool. "Not right now. Tomorrow. We can do this whole thing tomorrow, and you'll be able to worry yourself into a corner then. You have to listen to me now. You can't argue with a pregnant lady, it's like, a rule."

His eyes light up when she says the words. He keeps his arms tight around her waist. They're both dressed a bit like puffed up marshmallows so the embrace is a little silly, but silly suits them.

"Deal," he says, not even trying to argue. "Anything you want. Everything you want."

He's so clearly happy, and Marinette hadn't been worried, she _hadn't_ , it's Adrien and he loves her and he loves kids, this was something they'd talked about, but…it's still a huge relief. She feels so light right now it's a miracle she's not floating away.

"Adrien?"

"Yes?" He says. His smile is so wide it's _got_ to hurt.

"What I really want right now," she says, leaning in, "is for you to kiss me."

His arms tighten. "Yeah…yeah, I can do that."

And he does.

* * *

Her parents find out next, although that is _definitely_ not a part of Marinette's plan. She'd known Adrien and her parents were on social media together, but—well, she hadn't meant to break the news over snapchat.

"I thought you would have told them first!"

" _Why_ ," Marinette cries, "why would you think that?"

"They're your parents."

"You're my _boyfriend._ "

"You told Alya!"

"She's the godmother!"

"Oh," Adrien says, at a loss. Then, "Can I make Nino the godfather then?"

" _Obviously._ "

"Purr-fect," he grins, pulling out his phone. Marinette sighs and goes to find hers. She's already missed seven phone calls this morning—a rude awakening, when she'd been cozied up next to Adrien and his furnace-like body heat, the rest of the apartment chilled from the evening cold. She hadn't realized there'd been reason to worry yet.

"Who snaps a picture of his girlfriend and captions it _bakers' daughter finally has a bun cooking_?"

"I—you made that pun first!"

"To _you_."

Adrien laughs—it's her fault, in a way, because they'd been distracted last night with their own celebrating, and she hadn't really stopped smiling since, even now, as her phone starting ringing _again_. It was…well, kind of funny, and it wasn't like she'd had a better plan.

But there _had_ been a plan. It involved her actually _being there_ , there was a theoretical face-to-face involved, and now she was never going to hear the end of it from her dad.

"Your parents think I'm hilarious," Adrien defends, tugging her back down to the bed and into his lap. "Besides," he says into her neck, "now you don't have to be the one to break the news."

"Mhmm."

He drops a kiss on her shoulder. "It's an excellent pun. We can't use it on anyone else now—"

"Who else are we announcing this to through word play?"

"The rest of our friends?" He pulls her down as he talks, so that they're lounging more, backs propped up against a pile of pillows, allowing Adrien to pull the blanket over the both of them. It _is_ really cozy. "We could do one of those cheesy facebook announcements—"

"No way," she argues, "not until we tell your dad."

"…Y'know, _I_ told _your_ parents. You could always—"

She twists in his arms and glares. "No way kitty cat. That does _not_ mean I'm telling your father. Just because you're gossipy with my parents—"

" _Gossipy_ , really—"

"Minou," she says, "they already love you. I already love you. You don't need to keep hiding the fact that you're secretly a sixty-year old lady."

He tips forward and nips at her nose. "Minx."

"Senior citizen."

"Yeah, well, you love it, so jokes on you."

She sighs melodramatically. "Really, a _no you_ joke? Oh dear, I can't believe the hormones have addled your brain already."

Adrien's only response is a warm laugh muffled in the nape of her neck, which quickly degenerates into a more heated display of uh—parental joy. It's another half-hour before Marinette gets anywhere near her cell phone.

It's blaring out a somehow angry version of Papa's ringtone, the _Moustache_ lyrics muffled by folds of comforter, and as soon as she manages to dig it out and answer him he's demanding to be put on speakerphone. Marinette does it with a sigh, easily guessing at what's coming—honestly, it's been coming since she was fifteen, crushing on one half of the amazing person tucked up against her side.

Papa immediately crows loudly over the speaker. "Adrien!" he exclaims. "My son! I am so proud of you!"

To her horror Adrien tears up. Marinette pats his face and Adrien just mouths back _my son_.

"Papa," she says pointedly, "I think it's customary to congratulate the _pregnant_ one first. Your daughter, remember? Light of your life, always got good grades, can still kick your ass at video games?"

Tom laughs, delighted. "Of course _ma chère_ , me and Maman are so happy for you! Congratulations!"

"Thank you Papa."

"Adrien," Tom continues, because her parents have never known when to give up, "I hope you'll join us for dinner next weekend! We'll bring out all the stops, your taste buds won't know what hit them!"

Adrien's grin is watery. "I'm helpless to refuse Tom, we'd be delighted."

Marinette frowns, though it's all in good nature. " _We,_ he says," she mutters into the phone, "I'm not sure _I_ was included in the invitation."

"And Adrien," her father continues, unperturbed, "We'd be delighted if, now that you're officially part of the family," the implication that he'd unofficially been part of it is clear in his voice, "you must come by more and hang out. Sabine has been lording your lunch dates together over my head for months and I _insist_ you make yourself at home with me as well."

It's a good thing Marinette is confident in her parents' love, because since she started dating Adrien and her family had realized his general state of familial affairs, they'd basically been basking over him as a second son…one they'd always sort of planned to adopt into the family one way or another. Papa had once shown her a photo album that they'd cultivated, not just of newspaper and journal clippings for Chat Noir and Ladybug, but also candid shots of her and Adrien, and some baby photos of his, which—to this day—she's too afraid to ask how they got.

"You go on lunch dates with my mom?"

"Just when she drops by the university," Adrien edges, but from the way he's darting looks at her she already knows it's a failed caused.

Besides—she'd known about the lunch dates. She gets several snaps each Wednesday of whatever weird coffee drink they'd try that week. She just likes to bug him about it.

"Papa," she says, "we'll come by for dinner next week, like we promised. You and Maman can ask all the invasive questions then, just like I know you want to."

"Ah, thank you my little darling," Tom's voice is easy with affection. "We're very, very happy for you."

"Maman's probably already brought up a wedding, right?"

"No more than seven times I'd say."

"That's promising," Marinette laughs. "Now, I'm going to leave you with Adrien here, and you can try and convince him to call you Papa, just like you want." She glances over to the man in question, who's holding himself very still and looking decidedly pleased—it's good. She knows he has his own father, and they've gotten along much better as of late, and she would never want to have her family trying to take a role that's already filled…but, Gabriel has made it clear that Marinette is basically part of the weird Agreste family already. It's no worries if her family does the same for Adrien, as they have been doing all this time.

* * *

Marinette gets a phone call from her mother the next evening and it last approximately thirteen seconds before she goes, "Marinette, are you going to propose to that poor boy?"

"Mamaaan…"

"He deserves a nice proposal. Bring him over here and we'll cook you guys a nice dinner, and you can hide a ring in the dessert. I know all of his favorites."

"I am _not_ proposing to him at my parents' house."

"Well where _are_ you going to propose to him?"

"Who says I'm going to propose to him!"

Adrien is in the adjacent room, brushing his teeth—their apartment has a fairly open floor plan, which inevitably means that he's hearing everything she's saying right now. As if the big ceilings weren't bad enough, they _echo_.

"Marinette," her mother tuts, "you can't leave that darling boy in the lurch."

"Maman," Marinette says reasonably, "maybe we won't even _get_ married."

There's a silence over the line. It's a decidedly judgey silence. Marinette is certain that if she honestly told her parents she didn't want to get married, as like, a principle, they'd agree easily enough. So long as it was clear that they _were_ essentially married, and that Papa and Maman got to continue their weird courtship of one Adrien Agreste, which tended to include a lot of baked goods and skype sessions. But they all knew that Marinette wanted one anyway, especially since Maman had caught her once with a bridal magazine and some quickly jotted down designs, barely a full year into the relationship.

What—Marinette has never said she _wasn't_ a little obsessed. What was the point of all those weird years of mutual-and-missed pining if not some snazzy wedding fantasies?

Essentially, there was no way out of this conversation. Marinette sighed and resigned herself to at least talking her mom out of putting a ring in the family dinner. She was right, after all. She knew all of Adrien's favorites.

* * *

It comes up again before the evening's over.

"We're not getting married just because I got pregnant."

"Noooo," Adrien agrees, "I mean, I would, absolutely, but—"

"What do you mean you 'would absolutely'? I just said we weren't."

"Marinette—"

"It's _ridiculous_ , we don't need to rush things just because there's a baby now. We can get married later. Or never. I mean, not that I have anything against getting married, it's just—well, a baby is no excuse, it should be—"

" _Marinette!_ " Adrien shouts. She might have been talking over him. She huffs up, prepared to continue being annoyed and threatening and vaguely intimidating—she can _try_ , damn it—only to have the comment fall flat on her tongue before it could even be uttered.

Because he's holding out a box. A small, velvety square box and _what the fuck._

He pushes it into her hands. She's not too sure when he had time to go fetch it, since she'd caught him right as he came out of the bathroom, but with two kwamis in the house happily idling in the rafters it shouldn't really be all that surprising.

"When—how…you got a ring already?" It's _Sunday_.

Adrien blushes. "Not _already_ …I've had it for a few months now. I just uhm…

She blinks rapidly. "A few months?"

"Since April," he admits, "Nino helped me pick it out."

The box is heavy in her hand. She holds it up but doesn't open it. "You got a ring."

"Mhmm," there's a catch in his voice that causes her to look up, away from the _ring_ , and he's shifting in place, fidgeting. "I…" he trails off and takes a deep breath. "I love you, Marinette. I've always—I want to spend my life with you. I always have."

It hits her right in the chest, a complicated tangle of feelings that make her tear up. "Really?"

His eyes linger on her face. "Really."

"Oh." She whispers, holding the box ( _ring_ ) protectively against her chest. Then, "Okay."

It's the secret word apparently—Adrien lights up, a dazzling grin growing on his face and Marinette thinks _yeah, I could do this for the rest of my life_. It was always sort of a given, but…

They're doing things backwards, maybe, but it _feels_ right.

"Okay." She repeats, smiling wide and a little too stupidly to pull off her next few words, "But we're not getting married until everything else," she gestures to her general being, "is settled."

Adrien surges forward and kisses her, whatever spell they had apparently broken. He's too eager to do anything more impressive than peppering kisses over her nose and cheeks and lips, but that's okay, because she's too giddy to help him out. Marinette giggles.

"Absolutely, whatever you want," he says, breathless, and Marinette laughs, bright and loud.

"What, did you think I would say no?"

He kisses her on the lips once more, as long and drawn out as his enthusiasm will allow. "Nooo," he admits, face flushed, "not because you don't love me at least."

"Then because I don't want to get married?"

He threads his fingers through the hair at the base of her neck. "I don't need you to marry me to prove something…I'll love you as long as you'll have me bugaboo, ring or no ring."

Her nose wrinkles at the nickname. "Kitty," she snipes back, pressing close, "that's…well, really sweet. But I want you for the rest of our lives too."

"We wouldn't have to get married just to stay together forever," he says, because he can't help himself, because he's _always_ considering her position—even when they've talked about marriage before, about Marinette's idle _lycee_ era fantasies and Adrien's worry over how to even fill a pew of family seats. "But…well, if you're saying yes…"

She stands on her tiptoes, reaching up to kiss him, molding their lips together. It should be awkward to still be standing like this in their foyer, particularly when there are perfectly good couches and _beds_ a few steps away…but it's not—it's a little perfect actually, because it's _their_ apartment, _their_ lives together. Marinette's probably going to pass out from joy sometime soon and then she'll have to explain to everyone how it's not a health issue, she's just a little amazed over how her luck has held out this long.

…Of course, considering the people around her, it's probably best just to avoid _any_ sort of medical mishap, lest she ends up on bed rest at _two months_ pregnant.

"Mmm," he hums once they break apart, leaning down to press his forward to hers. They're both panting a little, catching their breath. What would Paris say if it knew it's resident superheroes were breathless from a little make-out action? "Is it sappy if I say you've made me the happiest man on earth?"

"Just a little." But she's grinning, ear to ear, and the warmth on her cheeks is quickly spreading to the rest of her body. Her stomach swoops and she just _has_ to kiss him again, quick and eager. "But it's not _untrue_ …not for me either." She shoots him a quick, darting look, not sure if she should try and reign herself in or move this moment to the bedroom.

Adrien sort of… _melts_ , then, fumbling with the box she still has tucked in her grip. He stares at her hand for a moment when she offers it, grinning helplessly. Then he's sliding the ring on her finger, following the motion with a soft kiss to her knuckles, and then Marinette _has_ to drag him to bed. It would be a crime not to.

Afterwards, curled tight around each, her left hand cradled on his chest—and hey, neat to know that this is a new kink for the both of them, always fun to find these things out—Adrien finally thinks to ask.

"Why _do_ you want to wait until uh…all of this," he gestures to her, "is settled?"

Marinette smiles dopily, feeling a bit out of sorts with how satisfied she's feeling. It takes her a few minutes to collect her thoughts.

"Because," she says slowly, burrowing into him, "it'll be so much more fun to tease our families…your dad is going to insist on micromanaging everything anyway, and this way it'll give everyone lots of time to be ridiculous about planning it. Besides, you've heard how Maman keeps bugging me to propose. It's already going to be hilarious when she finds out we got engaged in our pajamas, I think we should keep that mood up."

She closes her eyes, basking in the lull. Adrien's soft chuckle ghosts across her cheek.

"In my defense," he says, "I had a better plan. There was a sonnet involved."

"Hmm," she mumbles. "I'll need to see that later."

A kiss to her temple. "It's a promise."

She pushes up into him, giving herself another moment to grasp at what she wants to say, distracted by everything being all…Adrien, and warm and gooey, general rose-tinted stuff.

"But this was good too," she gets out, after a minute of grappling with the thought. "I like that it happened like this…I was never worried about how you'd react or that you were, I don't know—doing it because it seemed like you should. I've always been confident in you, it's so _easy_ to trust you…I like it." she says again, this time more firmly. "I like that we got engaged as a family, here in our home."

His arms have gone tight around her. "My lady," he says, soft and heart-wrenchingly sweet, "I couldn't agree more."

* * *

They surprise their friends with it on Tuesday, and then—because the world works in weird ways, they tell Hawkmoth before anyone else. It's…an ordeal.

They have these weekly—reformist meetings would probably be the best way to put it. Hawkmoth is many things, such as weirdly obsessed with trench coats, and scheming and plotting in general, but what he isn't is really _committed_ to the good fight. He likes Chat Noir and Ladybug well enough to meet and complain and sulk over whatever dumb thing happened that week rather than go out and be, well, a villain, and likes to dole out absolutely terrible advice in turn, so he's not _evil_ per se…just really _wrong_ about what 'appropriate use of resources' is.

"You can _not_ use your akuma on your competition!" she insists. "Your weird shady business doesn't need to get any shadier."

Chat nods. "Plus it's, y'know," he snaps his finger at Hawkmoth, "immoral. Unethical. That stuff."

"That stuff."

Hawkmoth frowns and tears at his croissant. "But what if I _really_ want to get rid of this one _brat_ of a CEO—"

"No."

"Surely it isn't that terrible. He's a terrible riot on the industry."

" _No_."

He pouts. Ladybug doesn't even bat an eyelash. Honestly, it's easier to convince Hawkmoth to use fair play in whatever industry he's master of—good competition and all that—than it is to convince him not to destroy someone whose fashion choices offend him. Which is stupidly hypocritical, coming from the man in the spandex suit and dominatrix mask.

Whatever. That isn't even the _point_ of their meeting this week. Chat cuts off the tepid threats at the one hour mark—complaining is only cathartic for so long.

"Look," he cuts in, "we have some news. It's…kind of super exciting and awesome and so you have to listen to us and react appropriately."

"I am _always_ appropriate."

Ladybug holds up a hand. "Debateable."

Hawkmoth looks ready to gear up and argue that point—to death, like always—so she says, "I'm pregnant."

Earlier this week, when Adrien had told some of their friends from lycée, he'd gone and gotten caught up and excited and blurted out _I'm pregnant_ to the whole crowd. It had taken a few minutes of congratulations before anyone realized that there was a very slim chance that Adrien was actually carrying a child…and he and Marinette had come to the agreement that she'd break the news, so long as he would pick up all the questions.

"You're _what_?"

"Knocked up, expanding the family," she starts, ticking off on her fingers, "have a bun in the over," Chat snickers, "expectant, and so on."

"Eating for two." Chat adds helpfully.

"We're definitely not kid-in about it."

"We hit the mother-load of luck, as it were."

Her and Chat high-five. Hawkmoth scowls.

"Stop that you two," he pouts. Then, running over what they've said, he vaults to his feet.

"Pregnant," he shouts, as Chat drops his head to the table, "You're pregnant!"

Several heads turn. It's not as if they're inconspicuous or anything, as this is their regular hangout and half of France knows where to scope them out. It's not as if there isn't anyone _filming them_.

Ladybug forcibly drags him back down to his seat. "Shh! I don't need all of Paris to know."

"Wow," Hawkmoth chuckles, untroubled. "Parents. It's true then that everyone must grow up one day."

Chat speaks into the table. "That's us."

"Congratulations are in order I suppose."

"Yup," Chat's muffled voice replies, "Thanks."

She takes pity on him and pats his head gently, even going as far as to tweak one of his silicone ears.

"We are really happy about it." she says. "And we'll be even _more_ happy about it if you can promise to not cause trouble for the next say, seven or so months."

Hawkmoth slinks back in his seat. "Not even if I find someone particularly obnoxious?"

She shakes her head. "Not even then."

"Hmm," he eyes her stomach, which is a little unsettling, "I suppose I must. Stress is bad for expectant mothers. Have you gone to a doctor yet? Do you need any money—it's a crime not to take proper care of yourself now."

Chat lifts his head at this. "Are you offering to—"

Ladybug clamps her hand over his mouth. "Don't finish that thought."

Something muffled comes out between her fingers. She grins, abashed, and leans back. "Sorry, it's just…" she turns back to Hawkmoth, "The concern is appreciated. That's uh, that's all we need." She's honestly stopped cataloguing every time Hawkmoth assumes they're dirt-poor—it's not untrue, she supposes, from his point of view, but it's still ridiculously insulting.

He straightens, staring at them down his nose. "I disagree. There are a vast many things you'll need. In fact, you should not have even come out today, dressed in that suit as you are. What would you do if someone tried to attack you?"

Her and Chat share a look. "That's sweet," Chat says after a pause, as if there's something else he wants to say instead. "But no one has tried to attack us in months."

"It does not mean they _won't_." Hawkmoth takes a sip of his drink, putting it down decisively. "I insist you go and rest up right this minute—I'll need an address, of course, to send some things to you, but we can't keep meeting up like this. It's unsafe."

Ladybug bristles. "Unsa—I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself—"

"It will aggravate—"

" _This_ is aggravating—"

"New lives are very fragile; you mustn't be stubborn about this."

"Stubborn about _this_ , oh come on, like I'm the stubborn one."

"I am not stubborn I am _right_ —"

"What you _are_ is patronizing."

" _Excuse me_ , I'm quite sure I don't appreciate your tone."

"Well I'm quite sure I don't appreciate you assuming I can't handle this myself."

Chat tugs on her hand. She simpers in her seat but relents, because this is getting off topic, _again_.

"It's not that we don't agree," Chat says carefully, glancing over at her and waiting for her nod, "We wanted to let you know today that we might not be able to meet as often. Although I can still come out, if you need to talk, or if you're considering turning your opposition evil and need someone to tell you how crazy that is, you know, normal stuff."

Hawkmoth stares at Chat. "Well. That is…" he looks over Ladybug again, clearly stopping himself from saying something. "Hmm. That's acceptable. I'll still need your address. I believe the child will look excellent in purple."

* * *

Gabriel comes next, because they're having dinner at the Agreste mansion and it just makes sense to hold off until then, face-to-face encounters being ideal over pretty much anything else when it comes to the head of the household. Marinette's handled one aggressively domineering man for the week, she'll take as much time as she can before telling the other one.

Of course, when they do drop the news, between dinner and dessert, all hell breaks loose.

He stares at them, open-mouthed. Marinette knew it was a surprise, but Gabriel had always liked her. She'd expected more joy. Some offers to buy them a few new houses. Maybe an entire line of sedans.

"It's impossible…" he mutters to himself.

Adrien frowns. He was appropriately touchy when it came to his dad and…well, any sort of opinions his dad may have had. No one in the family handled disappointment terribly well.

Marinette jumps in before either can say something. "I assure you, it's definitely possible."

…On second thought, that was an _immensely embarrassing_ thing to say. She blushes but doesn't back down.

Gabriel just continues to stare. It's a little unnerving. Then he says, uncharacteristically hesitant, "…Ladybug?"

Marinette's entire world view shifts.

"What?"

Gabriel nods and turns to Adrien. "Then you must be Chat Noir."

All of the tenseness in Adrien has bled out into confusion. He's still terribly stiff. "How…?"

"I can't _believe_ it!" Gabriel shouts, an unreadable look on his face, like he's trying to smile but it doesn't really fit with all the frowning his face naturally wants to do. "All these years and it's been the two of you!"

"No way…" Marinette whispers. Adrien shoots her a look.

"What?"

"I uh…this might be wrong but—you said all these years. And I just uhm, I only really know one other person who knows us and is really, really uh…uncannily alike, actually, and…" she's babbling. She knows she's babbling. She's trying very, very hard not to, but, "…Hawkmoth?"

Adrien turns shocked eyes to his _father_ …who nods. _Nods_.

"What the _fuck_." He whispers. Gabriel glares at him.

"None of that language here young man."

"No," Marinette says, "I think this is rather a _what the fuck_ scenario."

"Oh god," Gabriel hisses, looking pale and horrified, "I've been getting advice from my son all along."

"Uhm…" Marinette edges.

"Oh _god_."

Adrien burrows further into his chair. "Yeah, I'm—I understand the feeling."

She places a hand on Adrien's arm, even though it requires a little shuffling and uncomfortably placing herself on the edge of her own seat. "Well…at least now you know he always meant well."

"My own son _criticized_ me." Gabriel cries. "You called me an asinine old man with pockets too deep to find my own head in."

"Wow," Marinette blinks, "you have an excellent memory."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Adrien's gone blotchy all over, and if Marinette had to guess at his internal thoughts she'd put them smack dab between _oh shit oh shit oh shit_ and _I cannot believe I've missed this all this time_. Funnily enough, Gabriel was probably having the exact same inner monologue—actually, they were reacting to this in nearly _identical_ fashions…a thought that would clearly have to be shared later, when no one was in the middle of a life-altering point of view.

It's a good thing they have practice—they'd done this dance years ago, when Marinette had passed out as Ladybug and woken up with Adrien fucking Agreste hovering worriedly over her.

"After all my advice," Adrien starts, clearly torn between chastising and his usual level of hedged respect towards his father, "you went and bought me a _planetarium_?"

"You like science! And space!"

"An _entire planetarium_. Dad—that's…overboard. You know that's overboard."

Gabriel scowls. "You didn't seem too off-put when I gave it to you." Something occurs to him then. "Wait—is _that_ what you were referring to when Chat Noir told me to have 'limits'?"

"This is the most ridiculous thing to happen to me in the history of ever." Adrien says, dropping his hand into his face.

Plagg scurries out of Marinette's bag, clearly done with whatever conferencing he'd done with Tikki. "No way kid," he assures, "there's been _plenty_ worse things done in the history of Chat Noirs. One of 'em even put his own son in jail."

Marinette smiles placidly. "See love? Something to aspire to."

Adrien just groans.

Something must occur to Gabriel then, since he turns to Adrien with the oddest expression, a mixture of the old disdain he'd had from their teenage years, prior to the Big Fight, and the inability to hide how many god damn ridiculous emotions he actually had, something that had happened post-Big Fight. Which, now that she thinks about it, horrifically, was a scant two _months_ after telling Hawkmoth to—and she's quoting Adrien here— _get your shit together and use actual words or I swear to god I will drag you there myself_ _please stop texting me at two in the morning_.

"You," Gabriel says, pointing an imperious finger at Adrien, "are _grounded_. I am _betrayed_ that you would not have entrusted this secret to me, your own _father_ —"

Adrien splutters. "You didn't either! Should I be calling you Papa Hawkmoth now?"

"— _grounded_ I say. And apparently it's _Grandpère_ now." He finishes, clasping two firm hands on Marinette's shoulders. If the last five years hadn't happened—the last five years that they'd _made_ happen—she'd be fretting over Adrien, she's getting a lot of this _clear parental approval_ vibe from Gabriel and it's always weird to have that focus on her when his son is _right here_. Of course, knowing Gabriel, knowing Gabriel _and_ Hawkmoth, Marinette's a little surprised he hasn't congratulated her son on doing his duty to continue the family line.

Of course, knowing Adrien, he's probably more disgruntled at how they're skating over the whole _his father is actually Hawkmoth_ thing.

"You _can't_ ground me," Adrien mutters, mostly to himself, "I don't even _live_ here."

No one pays attention to him. They're definitely buying a lot of junk food before they go home. They'll probably have to stop by the Dupain-Cheng's for baked goods. In fact, unbeknownst to Marinette, Adrien is seriously considering just living at the Dupain-Cheng's bakery for the foreseeable future. When Marinette's parents had found out about the superhero thing they'd just given Adrien a scrapbook of Chat Noir and patted him a little patronizingly on the head. Sabine hadn't tried to ground him or revealed herself to be a reformed supervillain.

In fact, he thinks mutinously, as his father shyly pulls forward a purple kwami, complete with magnificent, stark white butterfly wings, he's going to go to the bakery right this very minute. If he wasn't an adult, he'd have Sabine and Tom adopt him. It'd make his whole thing with Marinette a little weirder, sure, but what was worse than _this._

* * *

After they leave the next morning, detouring to Marinette's family's house, Adrien gets a text.

 **The Parental Unit:**

 _[_ subject _: fatherly advice]_

 _I approve UR choices. Marinette is an exceptional woman and I should have seen the similarities between her and LB much earlier. The Mayor's daughter and I will be planning a wedding U won't 4get._

 _LOL,_

 _UR father HM._

* * *

"I should have known," he laments into Marinette's shoulder, somehow keeping up with walking and moaning piteously into an odd half-embrace. They're more or less toddling through the streets of Paris. It's still way too cold to cope.

Marinette—bless her soul—just hums a questioning response and hugs him a little tighter. She understands how he gets with his dad, and half the night had been spent with her curled around him, poking him every time he got too silent and saying _are you freaking out still_.

He groans again. "I should have _known._ "

"That Hawkmoth was your dad? That your dad was going to offer to buy us a house? That he was going to offer to buy us _two_ houses, in addition to paying out our apartment, just in case we somehow get bored of one? That he's already got a list of recommended nannies on hand to phone up in his spare time? That half of our friends are planning a shotgun wedding for us even though we weren't planning to get married until after the baby? Because, for the record, I definitely knew the last four."

Adrien stumbles to a stop. "That's a lot of things that I now realize are really ridiculous."

Marinette shrugs. He can feel it, pressed against her side, head shuffling up until it's planted on top of hers. "You grew up with money," she says, as if this is a reasonable explanation, "You used to have a schedule and a private driver who you called _gorilla_." Adrien winces. "What's more worrisome is how your definition of ridiculous and my definition of ridiculous are slowly becoming more and more similar…and not because you've realized your whole childhood was a sham."

Adrien laughs. He can't help it. Marinette _encourages_ his silly side, mostly with the gorgeous smiles and the giggling and by being equally as silly. She's _perfect._

"One," he says, holding up a gloved finger, "I've always known my childhood was a sham—"

" _Yes_ , but that wasn't because you had a daily itinerary and _three computer screens_ in your bedroom—"

" _Two_ ," he presses louder, continuing over top of her and her teasing, "I _still_ have a schedule."

"Yeah, a _school_ schedule. Also you're an adult now, adults are supposed to have schedules."

"You try telling that to Nino."

Marinette laughs. "Nino is the Peter Pan of our friends. The fact that he's a musician who, and I'm quoting here, _only drums to one beat, the beat of my heart_ , is of absolutely no surprise to anyone. He managed to find the one job that he's preposterously talented at which also allows him to keep his own hours and unironically call himself _Ripper of Beats_."

They start moving again, a slower meander as Adrien presses cold kisses to whatever available skin he can find, and then follows it up with a thoughtless worry about having a pregnant fiancé out in the harsh winter air. It's a vague one however, because Marinette will just frown if he brings it up so early on, and because he's still fumbling with the fact that he _should have known_.

"It's just," he says at length, "it's just _so_ obvious now."

"Why?"

He shoots her a look. "Who else do you know who still thinks _lol_ means _lots of love_?"

She laughs. "Of course. Now I feel silly."

"If only Hawkmoth had more reasons to say _lots of love_ to two strangers. Maybe I would've realized it sooner."

Marinette sighs, soft and sort of wistful. It's a happy sound. "Nah," she says, "this is a good time. Now I only have to deal with _one_ paternal unit freaking out and tossing money at me."

"Tom won't?"

"Papa might just…put me in a food coma. Between the free stuff and the free food, we're a very lucky couple."

Adrien nearly drools. "I'm telling you right now, I am much more excited about your family sending us baked goods. It's going to be _bun_ -tastic."

"Never speak again."

"Hot-cross my heart."

"Seriously," she says, her lip quirking up, "stop trying to get a rise out of me."

* * *

Adrien tells Chloe. Marinette finds out during her lunch break—and what is _with_ that, she's going to start having anxiety every time one o'clock rolls around—when she gets a series of unprompted text messages, followed immediately by a photo attachment.

 **Hell's Highly Attractive Mistress:** _any shot-gun wedding you two are planning best be in the fall—i'm much more suited to warm colours, and your complexion will be terrible come winter._

 **Hell's Highly Attractive Mistress:** _and you'll be terribly fat._

 **Hell's Highly Attractive Mistress:** _also, I don't believe in that gendered clothing bullshit, so everything i buy the child will be in yellow. keep in mind that adrien's beautiful blonde locks will suit the outfits much better and plan accordingly._

 **Hell's Highly Attractive Mistress:** _if you don't balloon too awfully from gorging on all of your parents' baking, perhaps I could be persuaded to help with a summer baby shower._

The photo is a selfie of Chloe holding up a card that says _congratulations on your fiftieth_. Marinette figures this is as close to a sign of goodwill as she's going to get—it says something about her life when she's more pleased than anything else.

Marinette waves off one her coworkers' offer to go grab something to eat, instead pulling up a new e-mail and drafting a quick reply. Chloe is a weird sort and gets a kick whenever Marinette acts like an old lady.

 _Dear Hell's Highly Attractive Mistress,_

 _When did you get a hold of my phone long enough to add the 'highly attractive' bit in there? You can tell Adrien that I don't support this proxy war the two of you have going on, and if he puts me in your phone as anything ridiculous then you can both forget about any of your high-handed planning of my life._

 _A summer wedding would be terrible. I may be a very young looking fifty, but even I would sweat myself to death in the Parisian heat. Just because you are Satan's lover does not mean the rest of us mortals can stand to boil._

 _Yellow is fine. Perhaps I will give birth to a chick and then everyone will be happy._

 _Sincerely,_

 _Ms. Dupain-Cheng_

 _ps. thanks weirdo_

She hits send without a second thought—even though their school days are years behind them, Marinette continues to staunchly refuse curbing any part of her personality to suit the other woman's. They'd all become something of uncomfortable friends, once Marinette had grown accustomed to the oddities of the rich and emotionally-bankrupt—thank _you_ Hawkmoth—and after Chloe had grown past her general bitchiness and turned a new leaf over. A new leaf of…well, pointed bitchiness, which, if you squinted, was more of an affectionate snarkiness. Like a dog with more bark than bite.

If you _really_ squinted.

She glances down at the photo on her phone once more, smiling, and shakes her head. _Weirdness is relative_ might as well be her life's motto. She's seriously considering painting the phrase in the child' nursery in any case.

* * *

A few weeks pass of relative normalcy, a new schedule emerging, one of visiting overly concerned parents and managing to go to work without having her boss chuck colour patterns at her face. Marinette keeps herself relatively in check, although she does spend an entire Sunday solely eating macaroons and shoving her cold feet under whatever warm body part of Adrien's she can find. Otherwise, things progress fairly smoothly, and she's confident that she can survive the rest of the minor ridiculousness's that'll inevitably pop up.

Well, she _is_ confident…until one evening finds her tearing up in the bathroom, staring down at the tiled floor. Adrien, blessedly overprotective and possessing a kwami with extraordinary hearing, overhears her soft " _Oh_ ," and rushes to find her.

"What is it?" he asks—he's still holding a serving spoon in his hand, clearly having have forgotten about it, even as it drips some part of their dinner all over the floor. She's too caught up to really care.

"Adrien," she whines, still staring, "I'm _pregnant_."

He nods. "Right, and…?"

"I'm carrying a _child_."

"…Marinette," he says slowly, creeping closer, "this is uhm—not news."

She turns to him then, shifting in place. "I know that."

"You do."

"Don't talk to me like I'm dumb," she snaps, even as he comes up behind her and stretches his fingers over the swell of her stomach. She leans into him, because she's weak and he's Adrien and there are a lot of hormones in her system making her even more weak and susceptible to all the general range of emotions. She doesn't even care that he's got one hand held out to the side still, holding that god damn dripping spoon.

"You're _brilliant_ ," he says in her ear, soft and warm, "The most brilliant person I know."

"Exactly." She sniffs.

He hooks his chin over her shoulder and they stay like that for a moment, Marinette contemplative and still pretty teary-eyed.

She feels more than sees the easy smile he makes against her neck. "I'm really confused." He confesses.

"I can't see my toes."

"Okay."

"Because I'm _pregnant._ "

He laughs. "Two ultrasounds and four months of morning sickness and _that's_ what convinces you?"

"Hush." She says.

"Mari…"

"We're having a kid," she whispers, like he might not know. "I don't even know how to parallel park."

Adrien squeezes her side. "I'm not sure the two are related."

"Adults know how to parallel park."

He doesn't fight her on it—because this is the thing, they've dealt with all the crazy relatives and now they have to get used to Marinette gradually turning into her _own_ level of ridiculousness. The irony is not lost on her, although she's not really sure it _is_ irony…school sort of failed her on that one.

It doesn't matter. _Hormones_ matter. Hormones are making a mess of her mind and causing her to forget what is and isn't ironic. Marinette feels herself tearing up again.

Adrien nudges her until she's turn to face him, planting his hands on her shoulders, eyes crinkled around the edges with amusement. "You can learn, if you really want to."

"I guess," she frowns. "I don't like driving."

"This is Paris," he consoles, "You don't _need_ to."

"You can drive," she accuses.

"Well that's the awesome thing about this," he says, quiet, like he's confiding a great secret, "We're partners. We get to do this all together."

"Mmm," she leans up and presses a kiss to his throat, quick and barely there. "That's true."

"Always a team, right my lady?"

She surprises herself with a laugh. " _Exactement_ kitty cat."

 _Ridiculous_. Four months in and Marinette decides to just give in to the crazy. It's not as if life hasn't been pushing her that way all along.

* * *

They facebook message Master Fu.

 **Marinette Dupain-Cheng**

 _9:14 pm_

Master Fu! We're taking the next year off to have a kid. Hopefully you'll be back in the country before the fall, as we'll be petitioning you for babysitting. We've already contacted Vulpina to babysit Paris.

Hope you're enjoying…the south? Wherever it is that you've ended up. Thanks for everything so far :)

✓ _seen at 6:42 am_

* * *

"You are _not_ allowed to wear the suit. There will be no gallivanting out at all hours of the night, not while you're pregnant."

Marinette frowns, careful and purposeful lines. "I'm allowed to do whatever I want."

Hawkmoth—Gabriel, _god_ , it's a nightmare keeping these things straight now—splutters. "But—the _child_. That is my grandchild you carry—"

"Okay, yeah, but I'm not an incubator, and this is still my body."

It's funny seeing the horrified look on Gabriel's face that's—up until this point—been reserved solely for the easily scandalized Hawkmoth. She never realized how much he furrowed his brows before.

"Next thing you'll tell me is that you plan to keep drinking coffee." Gabriel accuses.

"Well…"

" _Marinette_."

In the beginning of their relationship, she'd been genuinely intimidated by Adrien's dad—not only was he this _massive_ name in the fashion industry— _her_ industry—but he was the father of someone very dear to her. He was also wretchedly aloof, perpetually absent, and prone to scowling in favor of any other facial expression. For the first few months, prior to the whole Hawkmoth-and-pastries ordeal, Gabriel had remained that way…standoffish and a little bit scary. She'd learnt to hate him a little for it, for Adrien's sake.

But then the _presents_ had started, monetary shows of Gabriel Agreste's goodwill. Honestly, someone needed to go around to the one percenters around here and tell them to stop throwing cash at all of their problems. It was honestly a little surreal—somewhere out there, in their little nook of Paris, there was still a laboratory building proudly sporting _Adrien Agreste_ on its titular archway.

Maybe that's why she hadn't pieced together the whole _Gabriel is Hawkmoth_ thing until now, which was obvious when you'd seen them from both angles—while Gabriel liked to bandy his money about, showing the family name off and desperately trying to prove _something_ with inconceivably large sums _,_ Hawkmoth was just…nitpicky. Overbearing. Really ridiculously out of touch. He may have never bought Chat Noir or Ladybug a building, but he loved to criticize their choices, and then circumvent them entirely by purchasing his own solution. At the end of the day they both boiled down to ridiculous, slightly manipulative middle age men who thought money could solve all their problems, and who hadn't quite grasped the whole divide between _for the greater good_ and _I am the greater good_.

So, even though it was Gabriel scowling at her, huffing into his drink and being generally baleful to her entire outlook at the moment, Marinette was…well, fairly calm. Content even.

He _cared_.

"—fine, if you insist, I'll put on the blasted costume _myself_ and go out, but you are to stay put young lady. In fact, how soon are you to be on bed rest? You should probably take time off of work right now, I can call in some favours with that blasted bat of a woman you call your boss—"

Well. In his own way, he cared. It's entirely possible Gabriel thinks it is still the 1500s, and that Marinette is meant to hide away during her whole pregnancy.

" _Young lady_?" she raises an eyebrow. "No one's called me young lady…ever, actually. What era are you from?"

Gabriel huffs. "Well, you _are_. You were so much sweeter when we first met."

She shrugs. "I was sixteen and you were scary. Besides, you like me much better now."

"Lies and slander."

"Wait, when you say you'll put on the costume, do you mean _my_ costume or yours?" she raises an eyebrow—she's been practicing. "Because I'll concede a few things if you go gallivanting around in polka dots."

The look she gets in return tells her all she needs to know about the chances of seeing Gabriel Agreste in anything so…plebeian.

They're in the relative comfort of the Agreste family dining room—though Marinette's a little doubtful that there has ever been any family bonding time happen here. It means that Marinette doesn't flinch when Tikki floats over to her side to comment, even though she'd been happily tucked away with Gabriel's kwami for most of their afternoon tea.

" _Everyone_ looks good in Ladybug's spots!" Tikki cheerfully declares, diving in for some of Marinette's pastry. "You and Chat Noir would make an excellent father and son team!"

Gabriel takes a decidedly grumpy bite of his own food, unamused by the kwami's jokes, but Marinette turns the idea over in her head. A father and son team…it's a little silly, given that a lot of what they do now as superheroes isn't really geared towards _villains_. But it sounds like something that Adrien would like, underneath all the posturing and awkwardness that would surely start.

She holds her tongue—there's only so much pandering she's willing to do in one day.

"I cannot agree with it," Gabriel says at length.

Marinette smiles into her tea. "You can calm down, I wasn't going to go out in the costume anyway. I'm pretty sure my vaulting over roof tops isn't doing any of us any good, and even if _somebody_ let the whole world know I'm knocked up, it doesn't mean I _want_ to go around confirming everything while wearing _spandex_."

"Hmm," Gabriel settles back into his seat, much like a fluffed up bird smoothing its feathers. "That's acceptable."

It's weird how these little meetings of theirs are starting to be a calming influence on her. It's nice to have a measuring stick for the absurdity of her life, and no one topped Gabriel. It was really reassuring actually to know that Hawkmoth and Gabriel were one in the same—it would be such a hassle to have these conversations twice.

* * *

Sabine and Tom invite Gabriel over for dinner nearly three months later using stationary, a crimson red calligraphy pen, and Alix's brother Jalil as a courier for the message. Her parents find it amusing to no end to sign off on things with their names and titles— _Les Parents_ , with black and red polka dots where one would normally put x's and o's, or more normal things such as _sincerely,_ or even _with our gratitude_. They _know_ about Gabriel, of course they do, since Adrien's prone to phoning them up for advice, but Marinette had to stress that _Maman, it's called a secret identity because people aren't supposed to know_.

"Gabriel isn't _people_ ," she'd admonished, sealing the letter with a cartoon ladybug stuck on the folds, "He's family."

The Dupain-Chengs take this statement to a whole new level—Gabriel arrives exactly five minutes early, with multivitamins for Marinette and an offer to buy the deed to the building next door for her parents. They spend the evening looking over yet more candid photos of her and Adrien, of her and Chat Noir, and Marinette doesn't even try and figure out where they've come from. She barely twitches when Gabriel pulls out his own set, tucked into his wallet as if they're there _all the time,_ and starts trading with her parents. Adrien curls up beside her on the loveseat after dinner, and neither of them make a peep as Gabriel asks about her grandparents, her aunts and uncles, and about whether or not the Dupain-Chengs have considered the merits of franchising.

Maman even manages to get a quip in about Adrien's mother, and no one tries to murder the other one. That this is her yard stick doesn't even phase Marinette in the slightest. Even when Gabriel and Tom settle on the floor—the actual, honest to god floor, Gabriel in his designer suit sitting cross-legged and rifling through her baby photos—and start debating the advantages of Adrien's hair versus hers, which eye colours will suit the baby best, whether or not to teach them Cantonese _and_ Mandarin…even then.

Because this may not be normal, or even remotely sane, but it's _her_ normal. She falls asleep like that, on the couch and next to Adrien, the boisterous debate of their family around them a soothing lullaby of a murmur.

* * *

Hawkmoth and Gabriel Agreste are consolidated on her phone as a singular contact, though she doesn't realize the name change that either Alya or Adrien pulled until she receives a text from **Caw Caw Motherfuckers** with the usual subject title filled in. Marinette teaches Tikki how to reply to her text messages for her, because Marinette is not incapacitated, just pregnant, and she has an _actual_ job here to do, she does not have her own Nathalie to take over as a shadow boss as she becomes increasingly immersed in the pages of Wikipedia. She'd only endured a week of Gabriel's spam text messages concerning colour schemes and herbal remedies before turning the phone to silent and leaving it in her kwamis capable hands…even if Tikki _is_ prone to sending emoticons instead of actual replies.

Marinette's honestly convinced Gabriel has forgotten about his day job, and that Adrien spends as much time in his classes replying to his dad's increasingly frantic e-mails as he does actually studying.

* * *

Okay, so _technically_ , Marinette told Tikki first. Because Tikki still likes to come with her to work, riding shotgun in whatever purse or lunch bag she has on hand, and the moment Marinette had a spare moment to herself to contemplate _pregnant_ , Tikki had floated up in the privacy of the workplace bathroom and said, chipper as can be, "Marinette, you might just be able to pass us on!"

And sure, kwamis chose their partners. There was no guarantee that any child she had would be the right fit for a superhero—although, even at that point, pregnant for barely two minutes, Marinette was a little defensive on behalf of her unborn child. _Two_ superheroes raising their kids…chances weren't bad that Tikki or Plagg would find something worthwhile in them.

Of _course_ they would, she amended. Marinette's children are going to be fabulous. Adrien was already promising to be the most doting parent in the history of, well, ever, and Marinette was fierce about lots of thing, but nothing so much as the people she loved.

So, it makes sense, that as her pregnancy proceeds, the kwamis are…kind of intensely into it. Tikki falls asleep on her stomach, whispering secrets as if Marinette can't hear them. Plagg spends more of his time with her now, leaving choice pieces of cheese for her whenever she settles for long enough in one place, and even Gabriel's kwami had begun to emerge from her self-imposed isolation to take the time to inspect the future baby.

She relaxes into Adrien's side, sighing softly as he wraps an arm around her automatically, his hand splayed across her stomach. It's _exhausting_ being pregnant, even when you don't take into account their crazy stock of over-involved loved ones.

Despite knowing this, despite having ankles that are threating to explode and crying at four in the morning over the delivery man, Marinette toys with Adrien's free hand and says, "You know…we have to have another one."

He flushes. It's so _easy_ sometimes with him—he's delighted by the smallest statement, flustered by even the thought of their future. It's ridiculously charming.

"We still haven't gotten through this one." Adrien reminds her.

She wrinkles her nose. "I'm not thinking about that."

He tucks her closer, as if to shelter her from the future pain. Childbirth is all well and good in theory, but someone down the evolutionary chain hadn't really thought the bipedal-with-large-head thing through very well.

"You want more?" he asks after a beat.

She closes her eyes and smiles. "Of course I do. But that's not what I mean."

"Then…?"

"Well, Tikki and Plagg need to stay together…and I think they're really looking forward to having another generation to stick to." She admits.

They're lounging on the couch together, a favorite place of hers given the abundance of throw blankets bought between months five and seven. At her hip, as usual, are Tikki and Plagg, set protectively on the other side of her stomach.

Adrien nods. "Yeah I noticed."

"Plus Tikki already told me she had _good feelings_ about the next one. I think Plagg staked out a claim on this little guy already." She said, patting her stomach with her free hand.

Adrien traps it with his, twining their fingers together. "They could protect each other." He sounds delighted by the thought of it.

"Mhmm," she drowsily agrees, "A family legacy."

Adrien holds her tighter, lost in his own thoughts. After a pause, long enough for Marinette to yawn widely and begin the easy—and far too regular—descent into an afternoon nap, he says, "Three."

"Three?"

"Three kids," he says, pressing his lips to her temple. "We need one for Dad's kwami."

It's such a surprisingly enjoyable thought, unimaginable a year ago, that Marinette lets out a pleased hum. "Three then."

"But let's get through this one first."

"Agreed," she chuckles, wiped out. From her other side Plagg floats up to rest more firmly on the swell of her stomach.

"We'll protect your children," Plagg says, oddly solemn. "Just like you've protected all of us."

Adrien stiffens, reacting to the serious note in his kwamis voice. It sounds like some thread of conversation they've had before, an old promise maybe—Marinette makes a note to ask, when she's not so tired, when the world doesn't seem so pleasant and dream-like.

Adrien holds out his hand, nicking Plagg from his spot and tucking him securely between the two of them.

"A big family," he exults, "Our new team."

"Bigg'r and bett'r." Marinette yawns.

Plagg purrs. Marinette's vision is a little fuzzy, but she thinks Adrien might be purring as well. _Hormones_ , she thinks distantly, _they're fucking with me right now_.

"It'll be perfect." Adrien confides, and Marinette falls asleep with a promise of their future dancing in her head.

* * *

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1\. adrien changes marinette's name in his phone all on his own. it's now mama mie, because adrien is an old man*. chloe, upon discovery, heckles him to no end but doesn't actually change it, because adrien is embarrassing enough on his own.

2\. alternative titles for this piece is 'unparalleled use of the word ridiculous in a fic that still expects itself to be taken seriously' and 'a bun in the oven', because it was literally the only pregnancy pun that i knew. for the record, i now know a lot more.

3\. tom's ringtone on marinette's phone is france's eurovision song from 2014, and it's literally just about wanting a mustache. marinette's ringtone is the chorus bit, which goes "but i wanna moustache, a moustache, a moustache, i wanna have a moustache, a moustache, a moustache" etc. i know tom has one, which makes this funnier, okay, it's HILARIOUS this is a REAL SONG GUYS i couldn't make this up if i tried. also, please imagine tom playing this for sabine when it comes out, pre-mustache, and being all, "honey, c'mon, i need a mustache, the entire country KNOWS IT TO BE TRUE"

(sabine: "honey...please stop serenading me with the mustache song at three in the morning. we run a bakery. i need sleep.")

4\. i head canon marinette as being really good at handling hawkmoth and gabriel, to the point where adrien just calls her in the middle of conversations he's having with his dad and hands the phone off.

5\. i'm honestly trying to keep this short, but as you can see from my 10,000+ fic take on comedy, i have a problem with that.

6\. tartine et chocolate and a finger in the nose are posh baby clothing stores in paris. i don't even dress that nicely.

7\. thanks to ZipperDawn for giving me the phrase 'reformers meeting' for hawkmoth, who let's all admit needs them. i know it was just a comment from my last piece, but imma be real with you, those rambly comment really put into motion these 10,000+ words of pure mediocracy.

8\. the title of this piece, elle me dit, is french for 'she tells me'. it's a mika song which boils down to this overbearing parent telling their son how all their choices are terrible and they just need to fit in, you only have one shot, etc. etc. theirs even an english version of the song (also by mika!) where the 'elle me dit' is changed to 'emily' and it goes to an equally admonishing song about a daughter! i go with fanon here and imagine marinette and adrien's first kid as a girl named emma, but for some reason i found it really fitting to title this piece after something both wildly inappropriate (because let's face it, adrien and marinette will probably be really accepting, doting parents) and, when applied out of context, wildly i appropriate /i (because, as i said, elle me dit means she tells me, and this fic is more or less just marinette telling people some awesome big news).

also, guys, it works, okay, the first piece of this series is called papaoutai and is about an absentee father…yet, clearly, gabriel, while awkward and oblivious, is trying hard not to be. it may not be canon but god damnit i can make it work.

*ma mie, as far as i'm familiar with it, is an older term of endearment which essentially means my love; it literally means my female friend, going from mon amie to m'amie to ma mie, but with the older generation it's a love thing, and anyway, let's all agree that adrien agreste is a huge dork who would use whatever means necessary to make a pun work.

(but chelsea, you cry, what will they do about all the other stuff? will marinette take time off her undisclosed job? does this mean adrien has to give up his dreams of having the most qualifications ever in physics? the answer is uh—who knows. i like to think with as much back up as they have, marinette and adrien don't really want for a babysitter…but knowing the two of them, they'll probably be adorably ridiculous and doting, so let's say for the sake of argument that adrien finally settles into the professor role we all know he loves and secretly stalk his daughter on her first day of school…and second, and third, and fourth…)

i barely meant for this piece to get as out of control as it did, and that was just spawned from a few kind comments on another silly piece of fiction. if you want the dumb to continue i'm always up for continuing head canons in the comments!


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